I'm the same! I never stop at the memorials because here they're mostly not in places you can easily stop and while I'm interested I'm not especially keen to become the subject of a memorial myself. I do look them up online if I can see the name though. And where I know the story I often think of the incident that led to the memorial (the drunk 16 year old who was running into the road and hit by a drunk guest from her own birthday party - that one really plays on my mind). I love cemeteries too. Roadside memorials are interesting. They weren't a thing where I grew up, in South Africa but on the other side of the same country they were. They are here in Australia, at least where we live. Not in the three Arabic countries I've travelled in (and obviously those wouldn't be crosses, but no memorials of any type). Very popular in Greece. I was quite stressed by how many on one stretch of mountainous road we travelled.

The links either don't work or they're not mobile friendly. Just to let you know :-)

Glad to hear it!

I know parenting isn't a 9-5 job, but I've just woken up to parent a weeping 15 year old at 11:30pm as she realises what I've been telling her for weeks: she's not doing enough work to keep on track with schoolwork. Which would be OK if I wasn't a 45 year old who is having her own issues finding enough hours in the day to do her "school" work. Now I can't sleep and I need to get up early to supervise the teenager with overdue assignments and to do my own assignment...

How horrible! I hope you feel better soon and the antibiotics work their magic.

We used to visit a house that had one. It was continually getting stuck behind furniture or under furniture or on the edge of thick rugs. I'm not sure if that's a typical experience or not.

I remember your post! It was a fun story. So, $200-300 plus a good story is your inheritance :-) I really like the idea of buying a piece of land for camping - what a cool idea.

At home I often wear them on my head. I bought 2 cheap pairs, so that also helps. One pair migrates around the house and one stays put in case I temporarily forget where I had the other. The migrating pair, if it's not on my head is on the dining table, the hall table, the bathroom basin, the kitchen counter or my bedroom dresser. I spend a lot of time looking for them! I tend not to wear them for short bursts of reading like sending one text. At grocery stores etc I just tough it out and squint and try to get the focal distance right. (Try to imagine me backing away from the bottle on the shelf to get a good focus while squinting at the tiny writing!)

This would be unacceptably lenient to me - I'd insist on a hug repayment plan than extends over the next 5-10 years :-) (A mom needs to make sure she's still getting her hugs when they're in their teenage years!)

I tend to be pretty hard line in my parenting, but sometimes an issue is so big you really don't need to apply a significant consequences to ensure a lesson is learned. Dd15 recently booked an event for a large group of friends. She duplicated the booking in some way AND never got money upfront and some of her friends didn't pitch and didn't pay. I ended up being about $120 out of pocket. She felt terrible. We discussed how to make sure it never happened again (check your online shopping cart! collect money upfront!) then we moved on. I didn't make her repay any of it. In your situation it would depend on how the paperwhite was lost, I suppose, but I'd probably take a similar approach. At most I'd accept a contribution to replacing it. I'd also have him try to get it back (if there is a lost and found where he lost it, he must go and ask them, post in local lost and found column, contacting the police etc). Even if it's just going through the motions, he needs to try. (Good people do find things and hand them in.)

I've been following your posts about your daughter. I am thinking of your daughter, but also of you, and how you are feeling. Do take care of yourself as best you can. You must be beyond exhausted.

I've added a few rules to my life over the years to deal with these situations: I don't answer calls from unknown numbers, I don't stop and talk to anyone collecting or advertising in shopping malls, I don't go to any 'sales parties' at friends' homes and I don't buy from people who come to the door. In the case of people coming to the door, if I might be interested I offer to take a brochure and research online. They hate that but we ended up being pushed into buying something we wanted at too high a price once, so never again. If they're trying to sign us up for charity donations I interrupt and let them know I already donate regularly. And in the supermarket, I only interact if they have a tin for immediate donations. I once spent a long time waiting for an Irishman to finish chatting me up, thinking I'd make a $5 donation (payment for the pleasant accent?) only to find they were only willing to sign me up for a monthly donation for the rest of my life etc. Learning to be blunt has been really hard for me, so I'm rather proud of developing those skills.

When I still got those calls (now I only gave a mobile phone and I screen all unknown numbers then block unwanted callers) I would say loudly and cheerfully "I'm not interested. Have a great day!". and hang up. I learnt not to engage at all, just say my piece and hang up. But I did always wish them a good day because imagine having to do that job all day...

That is funny :-) Hope you got your car to the mechanic ok!

Do they work well? Was the 14yo satisfied? What brand? Christmas gifts aren't really happening this year as we'll be travelling, but he has a birthday in January, so that will be perfect!

I've had this when I've had the flu. Real flu, I mean, not bad-cough-feeling-terrible-so-I'll-call-it-the-flu flu. Hurt to brush hair, wear clothes, etc.

Not exactly what you're asking for, but in the same situation we opted to get ds a small MP3 player and transfer CDs onto that. It gave him something to hold, it didn't need headphones, and it meant we weren't fiddling around with CDs, or worse, letting him get his little hands on them! It was small enough to fit easily into a pocket or bag when we got out of the car. It saw us through long car drives and a few very long flights (he was THAT baby - hated being restrained, a nightmare to travel with). I think ours was a Zen, but whatever, small and tough is what you're looking for, and something with a built in speaker. ETA: we had something similar to this, just an older version, I expect: https://www.amazon.com/Creative-Zen-Micro-Player-Black/dp/B00086HTP0

When I'm following a specific eating plan it does impact on other people in the family - it influences what we eat and what food I keep in the house and invariably there'll be some listening to me moan about my weight and my food options. So I think my spouse would be within rights to comment. Whether it's meant as supportive is harder to ascertain, and whatever the intention, I still wouldn't be happy about it.

Ds9 has a bunk bed, with the lower bunk directly on the floor. When my mother visited for a month I put curtains around the lower bunk so dd would have some privacy when she shared with ds. Now that's my special spot. It's cosy and feels private and has a little light for reading. We're moving soon and I'm claiming a room for myself. The older I get the more I want to have space (physical, mental) just for me.

It's really expensive but dd15 has been using Lego robotics stuff at school and she thinks ds9 would love it. Not going to happen here, but if you have the budget and multiple kids that will get use out of it... Ds9 wants a dart board. I think he would use it too, it's just that it seems like a disaster waiting to happen (property damage, sibling damage etc etc).

I like my home warm but uncluttered. We have a fair amount of IKEA stuff because it works very well in small homes, but also heavy handmade timber furniture from Indonesia and India. I guess I like rustic, put together in a sleek way! When we moved in, our house had black marble look flooring and 3 or 4 black walls, a variety of light fittings, and black kitchen counters. Now it has timber-style floors, the same neutral colour walls throughout (extended to doors and door jams), simple, low profile light fittings and timber look kitchen counters.

I'm always embarrassed to vent because the issues are so trivial, and some of them are problems other people wish they had, but I'm just so, tired! First, literally, as sleep is ever elusive. Although I got 6.5 hrs last night which was pretty incredible. I remember when 8.5 was standard... I haven't been 'up to date' on my university work at any point this semester (running since August). I keep thinking this is the week I'm going to get there, and I never do. I have to do a 3 week practicum placement in a few weeks. It's been 13 years since I worked and I'm terrified. Our house has been on the market 7 weeks. That's at least 14 open house sessions which I've had to clean and tidy for. And I'm a bit of a perfectionist... We have to vacate the house for at least an hour each time, often at lunch or dinner time. We're eating out a crazy amount, and both the waistline and budget are objecting. The water heater needed replacing last week, and we've discovered that every single indoor light fitting needs replacing as IKEA has recalled both types we have. We can't find anything we like for an even vaguely similar price. We have to find a new house but we can't really look until we sell ours. I have given notice at ds's private school so we have to move to a suburb with a decent public school before February. Dh is taking a pay cut so I'm not entirely sure we can afford the suburb we were looking at, but I won't know until the cut is final and I know the net salary. We go away in December for a month. If our house doesn't sell soon the sale won't go through before we leave. We get back early January and I then have 3 weeks to find a house in a suburb with a suitable school. That would mean renting as an interim measure until ours sells. If the house does sell I'm looking at moving house in the middle of my work placement when I won't be able to get time off. Dh is already working 6 day weeks due to a crazy workload so time off is a problem there too. The month long holiday is a huge multi country trip and I just don't have the time to organise things. Every booking seems to take an hour online to finalise. It's way too much money to be casual about and "take each day as it comes", I have to plan things out. And then there's dd-nearly-16 who just will not get herself organised with her school work and accept that she's the only one who can fix that... And now it's back to the university work, because what else would I want to do at 8pm on a Saturday? (That's more whining that venting, I think, but there you have it!)

I make a big ratatouille and reheat over the week, adding an egg each day.

In my son's Montessori school each child cleans up their desk after lunch, sweeps under it, and washes and dries the ceramic plate they eat off (they have to unpack their lunchbox onto the plate). They also tidy their classroom at the end of every day, and I'm pretty sure there's some sort of big clean at the end of each term. The school is K-12, and the older kids take an international trip once in their high school years. They have to raise funds for this. One of the things they do is sweep the school at the end of the day, and the money that would have gone to a cleaning service goes into their fund. I think kids cleaning their schools is a brilliant idea. After all, it's their living space. I imagine things would also stay a lot cleaner to start with if they knew they had to clean it. (It is worth noting that this doesn't work with dd who has to clean her own room, but I imagine if I had her clean her brother's room instead she'd make very sure he kept it clean and tidy!) When I was in primary school I do remember we would all have to wash our desks annually at the end of the school year - soap and water. ETA: The Montessori school also does slippers in winter or barefoot indoors in summer. They bring their own slippers in their preferred style.

I have a glass or two of low fat milk in lattes every day. Dd15 and ds9 drink milk a couple of times a week, but it's not an intentional part of our diet. We eat yoghurt and cheese, including paneer I make myself from full cream milk. I assume we get adequate calcium from our diet. We eat a varied, mostly healthy diet. Specific vitamins and minerals are on my list of things I just don't have time to worry about. We eat sensibly and hope for the best. It's all ridiculously complicated - I was recently diagnosed with low iron (eat more red meat!) and at the same time told my cholesterol was just on the edge of normal (eat less red meat!). It's enough to make you give up all together and have Oreos and Coke Zero for dinner.